Patrick Nulty (Dublin West, Labour)
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Question 178: To ask the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government the groups that may apply for funding to the community led local development fund 2014 to 2020; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [32652/12]

Phil Hogan (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fine Gael)
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The Regulatory Frameworks for the next EU programming period (2014-2020) are currently under negotiation at European Level. Parts of the proposals presented by the European Commission in late 2011 facilitate the use of a Community Led Local Development approach (CLLD) for the delivery of a number of European Funds in the next programming round including the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), the European Social Fund (ESF), the Cohesion Fund (CF), European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development (EAFRD) and the European Maritime and Fisheries Fund (EMFF).

The LEADER methodology has been used to deliver EU Rural development funds since 1991 and is considered to be the prototype CLLD approach. This LEADER approach will continue to be mandatory under the EAFRD regulation for the delivery of rural development funds in the next programming period. However the use of a CLLD approach is not mandatory for other funds and the regulatory proposals leave the decision in that regard at the discretion of the Member States. In this context, as the negotiations are ongoing no decisions have been made with regard to the methodologies to be used to deliver EU funds in Ireland in the post 2013 period.